Troops Call for Military Airstrike? There's an App for That

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The U.S. military is developing an app that may one day enable
troops in battle to call in airstrikes using their smartphones.
The technology could help reduce the amount of friendly or
civilian casualties during combat operations, according to the
app's developers.

Called ATAK (Android Terminal Assault Kit), the military
app is being developed with Draper Laboratory, a
not-for-profit research and development lab based in Cambridge,
Mass. The system will be compatible with Android phones, and will
also be used for navigation, spatial awareness and a means to
control drone
systems, according to officials at Draper Laboratory.

The app could help protect soldiers by creating distance between
them and the fighting, while also ensuring that combat decisions
are made based on real-time information and logistics on the
ground. [ 9
Totally Cool Uses for Drones ]

"It's one thing for a user behind a desk in a climate-controlled
office to toggle back and forth between 10 windows, deal with
system crashes, and wait 60 seconds for booting up," Laura Major,
who leads Draper's human-centered engineering work, said in a
statement. "It's another thing to deal with those issues while
someone is shooting at you or if you're jumping out of a plane.
That's where ATAK comes in."

Typically, troops organize airstrikes using GPS
receivers and laptop computers, but this requires
simultaneously taking note of the location of friendly forces and
civilians, assessing the status of nearby aircraft, calculating
the time it will take for bombers to reach their targets, and
considering the types of munitions onboard. The information is
relayed to overhead pilots, but occasionally there are
transcription, communication or memory errors, Draper officials
said.

With the ATAK app, soldiers will be able to use handheld devices
to connect to military's network of satellites and
communications, allowing them to conduct
battlefield surveillance, establish safe zones and track
supplies that are being aerially delivered. The information can
be easily shared with overhead pilots, and the map-based
interface will enable users to label areas or specific buildings,
which will help troops on the ground add context to raw video
feeds or data points that are transmitted to bomber pilots.

U.S. Special Forces recently began testing a prototype of the app
overseas, Draper officials said. Next year, the app could be used
more widely in training and combat situations.

ATAK was tested in a variety of military aircraft exercises to
replicate some of the challenges faced by troops in real battles.
Draper engineers used this information to design the app and test
its efficacy.

"Operators who used the app during the exercises also indicated
that by keeping all of the information in a well-organized, easy
to access display, the likelihood of friendly fire accidents,
civilian casualties and collateral damage would be significantly
reduced," Draper officials said in a statement.